What You Should Know About Birth Injury Lawsuits
On the day of your child’s birth, the last thing you want to be thinking about is filing a lawsuit. From conception to birth, you have to place a lot of trust in the hands of medical professionals. For the most part, this trust is well placed, however, occasionally mistakes are made. If there has been any form of negligence, regarding the doctor’s duty of care for your child around the time of their birth, you could be eligible to make a claim. Filing a birth injury lawsuit is not a simple process and this article aims to explain what you need to know about doing so.
File Sooner Rather Than Later
As soon as you realize that something has gone wrong with your birth, that could have been prevented by your doctor, you should speak to a lawyer. As noted by The Clark Law Office, birth injury lawsuits are unfortunately one of the most common personal injury filings they deal with. If you believe your child is behaving abnormally, have a medical assessment done as soon as possible. Remember that birth injury lawsuits also cover any injuries that the birth mother has been subjected to as well. Doctors have a duty of care and mistakes aren’t to be taken lightly. Make sure you seek advice from an independent doctor and lawyer as soon after the birth as possible to see if you are eligible to make a claim.
Life Care Plan
One of the pieces of evidence shown to a court would be your child’s life care plan. This is an assessment of the type of care your child will need over their whole life. Why this is so essential to know is that it informs the amount of compensation you are due to ensure that you can afford the care your child will require. These assessments cover the cost of everything you might need, including; medical care, physiotherapy, speech or occupational therapy, adaptive equipment, household modifications (such as a wheelchair ramp), and even the amount lost due to a parent having to become a full-time carer. Although it can be distressing to see your newborn child’s cost of life laid out before you, especially if this wasn’t supposed to happen, this assessment must be made.
How Long Will It Take
Many people are put off from filing any kind of lawsuit due to the amount of time that they may take. Having to take care of a baby, amid a legal battle is not anyone’s ideal situation. However, if you are suddenly in the position of needing to provide specialist care for your child, making a claim is likely to be the only way you will be able to afford it. Some claims take a couple of months to settle and others take a couple of years. Most lawyers will do their best to make sure that the cases don’t go to court and that the medical professionals come to an agreement to settle. This makes the process a lot quicker, however, lawyers still need to spend a lot of time gathering evidence and researching similar cases. They will probably also need to interview witnesses and sometimes hire expert witnesses as well. Find a law firm that will put the effort in to resolve your case as quickly as possible, so that you don’t have to wait years for the compensation to come in.
What Will The Compensation Cover
The compensation that you would receive if you win your case would cover every excess expense, to do with your child’s injury. These costs are laid out by the life care plan assessment that will have been made during your case. On top of the costs listed above, you may also receive a sum for psychological damage or for the excess pain and suffering you may have had to deal with. These sums are entirely dependent on the case and up to the discretion of the judge. What you should also consider is the laws of the state that you are seeking compensation from.
Many states have caps on the number of compensation claimants can receive due to medical malpractice. This can seem unfair, especially if you have suffered particularly badly at the fault of a medical practitioner. However, these caps are in place so that hospitals aren’t bankrupted by a single person’s mistake. As much as you may feel you deserve more, it’s worth considering the real cost of receiving that extra money.
Know Your Rights
Filing any kind of lawsuit can be incredibly stressful for everyone involved. When you combine that stress with the pressure of a newborn child, you could understand why some people might be hesitant to file a claim. However, if your child has suffered an injury due to medical malpractice, it is not fair that you have to foot the bill for the rest of your life. I hope this article has helped inform you on what you need to know about birth injury lawsuits.
